RALEIGH – One of North Carolina’s fastest-growing communities, Wilmington, has some important decisions to make in the coming months and years. One involves a proposed convention center on the waterfront.
Cities across the state have unfortunately heeded the siren’s song of government-sponsored convention centers. I happened to spend time Tuesday at a city-owned center in Winston-Salem that falls perpetually short of expectations in attendance and revenues, even as it competes unfairly with the purely private Koury Convention Center in nearby Greensboro. Charlotte’s new convention center posts underwhelming numbers, too. Raleigh is in the midst of ripping up pavement and snarling traffic to build its own, unnecessary facility. In most other cities across the nation, you’ll find a similar tale.
In Wilmington’s case, the convention-center issue has popped up in one of the most interesting mayoral races this year, pitting incumbent Spence Broadhurst against the former mayor he defeated two years ago, Harper Peterson. The latter was once a supporter of a tax-funded convention center, but now questions whether it makes economic sense after gas-price spikes and other factors have changed the travel and tourism market (actually, it didn’t make economic sense before these factors intruded, but you take what you can get).
Other longtime supporters of the Wilmington project have also been sounding a bit more skeptical about the specifics of the deal, which would give a Virginia-based firm operating the convention center and attached Marriott hotel a leg up in competing with private venues such as the nearby Hilton and Blockade Runner (both of which have attracted my own events patronage, and will again). Raising the stakes still further, Raleigh attorney Hugh Stevens, representing other hotels, has sent a letter to the City of Wilmington demanding that the convention-center effort be halted.
It’s regrettable but hardly shameful that Wilmington leaders, of both political parties, joined in with the urban-development crowd years ago in seeking a tax-funded convention center. It was the “in” thing to do, and got a boost from a parade of fast-talking “consultants” who made the economics sound enticing. The Brookings Institution’s Heywood Sanders, among others, has revealed the faulty reasoning and bad statistics behind the sales job. Now, it’s time to take another look before the city reaches a point of no return.
A compelling reason for Wilmington and New Hanover County officials to rethink their decision can be found in a new report from the John Locke Foundation on local-government spending. Written by JLF fiscal policy analyst Joe Coletti, it looked at city and county spending over the past 10 years in North Carolina’s 10 largest communities. Wilmington posted the fastest rate of spending growth during this period, 42 percent after adjusting for inflation and population growth.
Was some of this spending growth justified? Perhaps. But it hasn’t eliminated many of Wilmington’s major challenges, including traffic congestion, crime, and school construction. Given the taxpayers’ demonstrable unwillingness to live with big new tax increases, these facts suggest that the city and county need to set clear, defensible priorities with all revenues currently flowing or anticipated.
Is subsidizing the convention industry really such a priority? I submit that this question is rhetorical.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.